TroytlePower

Before our wedding two years ago, my wife and I decided that we both wanted to lose some weight and started a ketogenic diet. Keto diets are super low-carb (basically, you eat zero carbs if you can), and are a bit controversial because it’s actually a medical treatment first, and can have some problematic side effects. We didn’t stay on the diet for too terribly long (partially because we were lucky enough to spend time in Italy for a honeymoon, and pasta pasta pasta pasta pasta pasta). Our intention was to still stay on a relatively low carb diet, but that didn’t really work out for several reasons. When I was on keto for seven months, I lost close to 60 pounds. I was the skinniest I’ve been as an adult. It was great.

Since then I’ve pretty much gained all of it back.

For the past couple of weeks, I’ve been intending to start doing more of my prefered physical activity, riding a bike, but the fires in northern California have been blowing up a lot of smoke to Southern Oregon, which means the air-quality has been so bad that it’s been really tough for me to get outside. There are other things I could do, like using a treadmill or even a stationary bike, but I’m a naturally lazy person and the smoke makes for a nice excuse.

BUT NO LONGER! I’ve got to start at least making an attempt to get back to a healthier weight.

In order to do that, I’m starting three things effective immediately:

1) Biking

I’m going to start riding my bike. If the air-quality will allow it, that means going out onto the roads near me every day. If the air-quality won’t allow it, I’m going to go down to the gym, and I’m going to sit there, in public, feeling super uncomfortable, and I’m going to ride a stationary bike. I need to get some aerobics into my life because I know that I can make a huge difference in my weight, and it also just makes me feel better about myself and gives me more energy throughout the day.

2) Bye-bye, bread.

This is a tough one for me because I really, really like bread and bread adjacent products! I know that dropping some carbs will make a huge difference in my health, and getting rid of bread is an easy way to do that. So, I’m no longer going to have bread, or tortillas, or crackers, or chips,  or oh no oh god I’ve got to start making this list or I’m not gonna have anything anymore! I’m not going to go totally no carb or low-carb, but I’m going to get rid of the unnecessary stuff. I’ve been doing Hello Fresh lately, so a lot of the meals that I get have good healthy carbs, but also unnecessary ones; if it’s a burger or tacos, I know I can enjoy it just as well on a plate as I can on carbs.

3) Banish the beer!

I like drinking beer; Beer taste good! I find it really refreshing, and a nice IPA with a meal makes me feel relaxed immediately. On the other hand, I know the drinking beer also immediately makes me fat. This is a tough one to drop psychologically, but it will probably be the biggest contributor to being able to shed some pounds, and definitely towards feeling better.

… and that’s it, at least for now. That’s my plan to get healthier. There’s nothing revolutionary here, and these aren’t big steps, but I’m going to work towards a little bit of aerobic exercise, a drop in unnecessary carbs, and a complete abandonment of beer.

But, as with any diet, margaritas don’t count.